Immaculate Conception - Why Did It Take 1,854 Years to Discover This Doctrine?

[visionary]

This--

"Yet, Mary conceived God, and bore Him.
Yet you think God gave her corruptible flesh...with stains of sin?"

That's a rationalization and does not show that the Immaculate Conception...

1. is real
2. was necessary
3. was believed in by the early church, or
4. is the testimony of Scripture.

Yea, would that even this had been all the length to which they had gone with their silly efforts, and that they had not declared that the only-begotten Christ, who has descended from the bosom of the Father,2 John 1:18 is the son of a certain woman, Mary, and born of blood and flesh and the varied impurities proper to women! Acts of the Disputation with Manes

For 33 days Mary was "unclean" (impure)from the birth of Jesus. The days of purification. See Lev. 12:4-6.

Luke 2:21 And when eight days were accomplished for the circumcising of the child, his name was called JESUS, which was so named of the angel before he was conceived in the womb. 22 And when the days of her purification according to the law of Moses were accomplished, they brought him to Jerusalem, to present him to the Lord;

Mary is unclean and brings a sin offering..

Leviticus 12:4 And she shall then continue in the blood of her purifying three and thirty days; she shall touch no hallowed thing, nor come into the sanctuary, until the days of her purifying be fulfilled. 5 But if she bear a maid child, then she shall be unclean two weeks, as in her separation: and she shall continue in the blood of her purifying threescore and six days. 6 And when the days of her purifying are fulfilled, for a son, or for a daughter, she shall bring a lamb of the first year for a burnt offering, and a young pigeon, or a turtledove, for a sin offering, unto the door of the tabernacle of the congregation, unto the priest:

 

[WarriorAngel]

Show me in Scripture where it says Mary was sinless.

Genesis 3;15

[bible]Genesis 3:15[/bible]

What is enmity?
A complete seperation...enemies...absolute polar opposites...etc

So the 'woman and her seed' have enmity to satan.
How can she be like her seed in enmity if she is corrupted by the enemy?

If her seed is having enmity of satan, and she 'and her seed' have enmity, then both are uncorrupted by sin.

Often overlooked and mistaken...that verse.
But this is the first prophecy of Christ...and His Mother the Woman.

Both of which will see no sin. If it said the woman would produce a seed which has enmity, then we would know she did not share in the sinlessness.
But it says the woman AND her seed...meaning both have enmity.

You should really look into this verse to understand.








AS for Mary offering a sin offering and cleaning herself...
She like her Son [Who was/is God] both did all the human traditions...while alive, so neither would transgress the laws of the Judaic faith, keeping them spotless and innocent of blame.

This doesnt mean she was a sinner, but she followed the custom ordered of her in her faith in that time.

Prooving above all else, she was faithful and obedient to the Seat of Moses....& to the religion established by God for the time before the Risen Lord.

Grace kept her obedient and humble. Sin, of satan, would be pride and refusal.

 

[Albion]

Genesis 3;15

[bible]Genesis 3:15[/bible]

Clearly this does not say she was sinless; it says that she will accomplish a great mission. The Apostles also accomplished much, Peter for example, and were not sinless. MORE IMPORTANT, Genesis 3:15 is not speaking of Mary. That is obvious.

What is enmity?
A complete seperation...enemies...absolute polar opposites...etc

So the 'woman and her seed' have enmity to satan.
How can she be like her seed in enmity if she is corrupted by the enemy?

In the same way as anyone can be rescued from sin by God's grace.

 

[Rick Otto]

Way over-reaching.
Enmity exists between sinful people. You have taken enmity from between them & made it something they have, which is not at all the case, not what scripture says.
Enmity does not establish sinlessness or a precondition requiring it.
We have not overlooked or mistaken thisverse. You have mistaken "between" for "have" and invented sinlessness as a precondition for enmity.

Of course making the sin offering didn't mean she was a sinner. Being only human did, being a woman who has given birth, made her impure. Her sin offering was for her sin of impurity, not for a sin of immorality.
It wasn't "Sin of Satan", rather "sin of Adam".

It is typicaly Roman to make something of nothing (enmity) & nothing of something (sin & sacrifice).

 

[WarriorAngel]

Let us hate them who are worthy of hatred; let us turn away from them from whom God turns away; let us also ourselves say unto God with all boldness concerning all heretics, Do not I hate them, O Lord, that hate You, and am not I grieved with Your enemies? For there is also an enmity which is right, according as it is written, I will put enmity between you and her seed Genesis 3:15; for friendship with the serpent works enmity with God, and death.

http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/310116.htm
St Cyril

Genesis 3:15

No direct or categorical and stringent proof of the dogma can be brought forward from Scripture. But the first scriptural passage which contains the promise of the redemption, mentions also the Mother of the Redeemer. The sentence against the first parents was accompanied by the Earliest Gospel (Proto-evangelium), which put enmity between the serpent and the woman: "and I will put enmity between thee and the woman and her seed; she (he) shall crush thy head and thou shalt lie in wait for her (his) heel" (Genesis 3:15). The translation "she" of the Vulgate is interpretative; it originated after the fourth century, and cannot be defended critically. The conqueror from the seed of the woman, who should crush the serpent's head, is Christ; the woman at enmity with the serpent is Mary. God puts enmity between her and Satan in the same manner and measure, as there is enmity between Christ and the seed of the serpent. Mary was ever to be in that exalted state of soul which the serpent had destroyed in man, i.e. in sanctifying grace. Only the continual union of Mary with grace explains sufficiently the enmity between her and Satan. The Proto-evangelium, therefore, in the original text contains a direct promise of the Redeemer, and in conjunction therewith the manifestation of the masterpiece of His Redemption, the perfect preservation of His virginal Mother from original sin. http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/07674d.htm

Incidently, when the OT speaks of enmity it means the seperation from God.

So if the woman and her seed has enmity to the serpent, they have not a seperation from God. Sin seperates man from God...whereas they have enmity to sin of the serpent.
http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/0103.htm

 

[mont974x4]

Let us hate them who are worthy of hatred; let us turn away from them from whom God turns away; let us also ourselves say unto God with all boldness concerning all heretics, Do not I hate them, O Lord, that hate You, and am not I grieved with Your enemies? For there is also an enmity which is right, according as it is written, I will put enmity between you and her seed Genesis 3:15; for friendship with the serpent works enmity with God, and death.

http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/310116.htm
St Cyril

Genesis 3:15

No direct or categorical and stringent proof of the dogma can be brought forward from Scripture. But the first scriptural passage which contains the promise of the redemption, mentions also the Mother of the Redeemer. The sentence against the first parents was accompanied by the Earliest Gospel (Proto-evangelium), which put enmity between the serpent and the woman: "and I will put enmity between thee and the woman and her seed; she (he) shall crush thy head and thou shalt lie in wait for her (his) heel" (Genesis 3:15). The translation "she" of the Vulgate is interpretative; it originated after the fourth century, and cannot be defended critically. The conqueror from the seed of the woman, who should crush the serpent's head, is Christ; the woman at enmity with the serpent is Mary. God puts enmity between her and Satan in the same manner and measure, as there is enmity between Christ and the seed of the serpent. Mary was ever to be in that exalted state of soul which the serpent had destroyed in man, i.e. in sanctifying grace. Only the continual union of Mary with grace explains sufficiently the enmity between her and Satan. The Proto-evangelium, therefore, in the original text contains a direct promise of the Redeemer, and in conjunction therewith the manifestation of the masterpiece of His Redemption, the perfect preservation of His virginal Mother from original sin. http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/07674d.htm

Incidently, when the OT speaks of enmity it means the seperation from God.

So if the woman and her seed has enmity to the serpent, they have not a seperation from God. Sin seperates man from God...whereas they have enmity to sin of the serpent.
http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/0103.htm

Then your logic would demand that ALL women are sinless and not seperated from God. However, we know Scripture tells us otherwise.

The Bible tells us the ALL have sinned, not just men. It tells us that no one is good, not just men.

The only way Christ was not subject to sin nature is because He had a different Father than we do.

Mary was just a sinner, just as we are all sinners.

 

[HisKid1973]

And you would think that if "one" human was set apart we would have heard more about it in sacred scriptures and not have to speculate about it..

 

[Rick Otto]

Let us hate them who are worthy of hatred; let us turn away from them from whom God turns away; let us also ourselves say unto God with all boldness concerning all heretics, Do not I hate them, O Lord, that hate You, and am not I grieved with Your enemies? For there is also an enmity which is right, according as it is written, I will put enmity between you and her seed Genesis 3:15; for friendship with the serpent works enmity with God, and death.

http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/310116.htm
St Cyril

Genesis 3:15

No direct or categorical and stringent proof of the dogma can be brought forward from Scripture. But the first scriptural passage which contains the promise of the redemption, mentions also the Mother of the Redeemer. The sentence against the first parents was accompanied by the Earliest Gospel (Proto-evangelium), which put enmity between the serpent and the woman: "and I will put enmity between thee and the woman and her seed; she (he) shall crush thy head and thou shalt lie in wait for her (his) heel" (Genesis 3:15). The translation "she" of the Vulgate is interpretative; it originated after the fourth century, and cannot be defended critically. The conqueror from the seed of the woman, who should crush the serpent's head, is Christ; the woman at enmity with the serpent is Mary. God puts enmity between her and Satan in the same manner and measure, as there is enmity between Christ and the seed of the serpent. Mary was ever to be in that exalted state of soul which the serpent had destroyed in man, i.e. in sanctifying grace. Only the continual union of Mary with grace explains sufficiently the enmity between her and Satan. The Proto-evangelium, therefore, in the original text contains a direct promise of the Redeemer, and in conjunction therewith the manifestation of the masterpiece of His Redemption, the perfect preservation of His virginal Mother from original sin. http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/07674d.htm

Incidently, when the OT speaks of enmity it means the seperation from God.

So if the woman and her seed has enmity to the serpent, they have not a seperation from God. Sin seperates man from God...whereas they have enmity to sin of the serpent.

BUSTED!
There are only 3 uses of "enmity" in the OT, and the other two are about hatred between men, nothing to do directly with God.
Nu 35:21 - Show Context Or in enmity smite him with his hand, that he die: he that smote him shall surely be put to death; for he is a murderer: the revenger of blood shall slay the murderer, when he meeteth him.
Nu 35:22 - Show Context But if he thrust him suddenly without enmity, or have cast upon him any thing without laying of wait,
Care to retract?

Again you rephrase scripture:"So if the woman and her seed has enmity to the serpent, they have not a seperation from God."
Enmity has been placed between them. They are enemies because they have opposing motives. The only thing one needs to stop being an enemey of God is faith in Him, not a miraculous state of sinlessness.

 

[visionary]

Your own Catholic church father said this....

Yea, would that even this had been all the length to which they had gone with their silly efforts, and that they had not declared that the only-begotten Christ, who has descended from the bosom of the Father,2 John 1:18 is the son of a certain woman, Mary, and born of blood and flesh and the varied impurities proper to women! Acts of the Disputation with Manes

Mary born of blood and flesh and the varied impurities
Archelaus
- Acts of the Disputation with the Heresiarch Manes Listed in Catholic Encyclopedia as a Church Father.

 

[Catholic Christian]

Just out of curiousity, if Mary "was preserved immaculate from all stain of original sin" (Immaculate Conception), why did it take 1,854 years after the birth of Jesus before anyone realized this? How come the Catholic church did not recognize this fact until 1854 AD? It wasnt until Pope Pius IX uttered those words on December 8, 1854, that this doctrine was issued.

pax vobis from
the Catholic Crusader

There is a difference between "defining" a doctrine and "recognizing" it. The Church "defined" the doctrine in 1854, but She has ALWAYS believed it.
Was God not Trinity before the word Trinity was used to define God's triune nature? Of course, He was ALWAYS triune, regardless of when the precise definition was offered by Holy Mother Church. Likewise, was Mary Immaculately conceived before Pius said she was? Of course she was.

Please read this link:
http://www.catholic.com/library/Immaculate_Conception_and_Assum.asp

 

[Albion]

pax vobis from
the Catholic Crusader

There is a difference between "defining" a doctrine and "recognizing" it. The Church "defined" the doctrine in 1854, but She has ALWAYS believed it.

It did not take 1854 years to come up with the doctrine of the Immaculate Conception, that's correct, but by the same token it was not a belief of the early Church. It originated later.

 

[Catholic Christian]

[/size][/b]

It did not take 1854 years to come up with the doctrine of the Immaculate Conception, that's correct, but by the same token it was not a belief of the early Church. It originated later.

"Having excepted the holy Virgin Mary, concerning whom, on account of the honor of the Lord, I wish to have absolutely no question when treating of sins—for how do we know what abundance of grace for the total overcoming of sin was conferred upon her, who merited to conceive and bear him in whom there was no sin?—so, I say, with the exception of the Virgin, if we could have gathered together all those holy men and women, when they were living here, and had asked them whether they were without sin, what do we suppose would have been their answer?" Augustine (Nature and Grace 36:42 [A.D. 415]).

You know, the word "Trinity" came much later too. Is that a good reason to deny the Trinity?

I invite you to read this link:
http://www.catholic.com/library/Immaculate_Conception_and_Assum.asp

Peace

 

[simonthezealot]

—for how do we know what abundance of grace for the total overcoming of sin was conferred upon her, who merited to conceive and bear him in whom there was no sin[/B]

Seems pretty obvious Aug was singling out our Lord and Savior...

 

[Catholic Christian]

Seems pretty obvious Aug was singling out our Lord and Savior...

Sure, it sounds obvious, WHEN YOU EDIT OUT THE FIRST HALF OF THE QUOTE !!!

 

[simonthezealot]

Sure, it sounds obvious, WHEN YOU EDIT OUT THE FIRST HALF OF THE QUOTE !!!

Dude slow down and look...he says in WHOM THERE WAS NO SIN...
I've read Augustin and Ambrose their's was the theology of that day and it was that ONLY Christ was SINLESS...

 

[Albion]

"Having excepted the holy Virgin Mary, concerning whom, on account of the honor of the Lord, I wish to have absolutely no question when treating of sins—for how do we know what abundance of grace for the total overcoming of sin was conferred upon her, who merited to conceive and bear him in whom there was no sin?—so, I say, with the exception of the Virgin, if we could have gathered together all those holy men and women, when they were living here, and had asked them whether they were without sin, what do we suppose would have been their answer?" Augustine (Nature and Grace 36:42 [A.D. 415]).

You confirmed my point.

The belief is not Apostolic.

Augustine stated his personal opinion almost 400 years after Christ. That proves that 400 years after Christ, the idea was thought of by at least one person, that's all. Not Scripture. Not Tradition. Not an Apostolic belief.

 

[Rick Otto]

But better yet, what would Mary have said?
I suspect in her humility & grace she might've said something along this line:
1Jo 1:8 -If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.

 

[Catholic Christian]

[/b]

You confirmed my point.

The belief is not Apostolic.

Augustine stated his personal opinion almost 400 years after Christ. That proves that 400 years after Christ, the idea was thought of by at least one person, that's all. Not Scripture. Not Tradition. Not an Apostolic belief.

You should read Cardinal Newman's "Essay On The Development Of Christian Doctrine". In it, he explains the difference between authentic development of doctrine and invention of false doctrine.

Doctrine develops. The Church grows in understanding. We know more about the Trinity now than St Paul did, and we know more about Mary now than the Apostles did. This is not hard to understand.

It did take time for this doctrine to develop, but that has nothing to do with whether it is true or not. Two Franciscans, William of Ware and Blessed John Duns Scotus, helped develop the theology. They point out that Mary’s Immaculate Conception enhances Jesus’ redemptive work. Other members of the human race are cleansed from original sin after birth. In Mary, Jesus’ work was so powerful as to prevent original sin at the outset.

In Luke 1:28 the angel Gabriel, speaking on God’s behalf, addresses Mary as “full of grace” (or “highly favored”). In that context this phrase means that Mary is receiving all the special divine help necessary for the task ahead. However, the Church grows in understanding with the help of the Holy Spirit. The Spirit led the Church, especially non-theologians, to the insight that Mary had to be the most perfect work of God next to the Incarnation. Or rather, Mary’s intimate association with the Incarnation called for the special involvement of God in Mary’s whole life. The logic of piety helped God’s people to believe that Mary was full of grace and free of sin from the first moment of her existence. Moreover, this great privilege of Mary is the highlight of all that God has done in Jesus. Rightly understood, the incomparable holiness of Mary shows forth the incomparable goodness of God.

“It is no wonder, then, that the usage prevailed among the holy Fathers whereby they called the mother of God entirely holy and free from all stain of sin, fashioned by the Holy Spirit into a kind of new substance and new creature. Adorned from the first instant of her conception with the splendors of an entirely unique holiness, the Virgin of Nazareth is, on God’s command, greeted by an angel messenger as ‘full of grace’ (cf. Luke 1:28). To the heavenly messenger she replies: ‘Behold the handmaid of the Lord, be it done to me according to thy word’ (Luke 1:38)” (Dogmatic Constitution on the Church, 56).

pax vobis
from Catholic Crusader

 

[Albion]

Doctrine develops.

The Church grows in understanding. We know more about the Trinity now than St Paul did, and we know more about Mary now than the Apostles did. This is not hard to understand.

If it is not there at the beginning, it is a human creation. Put another way, not Apostolic.

Two Franciscans, William of Ware and Blessed John Duns Scotus, helped develop the theology.

...more than a millennium after Christ!

They point out that Mary’s Immaculate Conception enhances Jesus’ redemptive work. Other members of the human race are cleansed from original sin after birth. In Mary, Jesus’ work was so powerful as to prevent original sin at the outset.

Interesting speculation. Nothing to make dogma out of, however.

 

[Rick Otto]

Cardinal Newman should read your quote by Augustine where he admits that that he has no way of knowing Mary's relative state of sin/sinlessness:
"—for how do we know what abundance of grace for the total overcoming of sin was conferred upon her, who merited to conceive and bear him in whom there was no sin?—"
Cleary he has no knowlege, and cleary the personal pronoun "him" is the object of the phrase "in whom there was no sin".

In his book "Papal Sin -Structures of Deceit", Catholic history professor at Northwestern University, Gary Wills, details how Pius IX, kidnapper of Edgardo Mortara, used the definition of Immaculate Conception as the ostensible agenda for the council wherein he inserted "Infallability" and manipulated the outcome around strong objections. All the principles who opposed infallability were duped into not attending the council which was supposedly only to be about Immaculate Conception. It is this intellectual dishonesty that has become institutionalized that Gary Wills & many other loyal RCatholics detest about the Church they remain loyal to.